Western nations are working on a compromise UN resolution on Kosovo that would give ethnic Albanians and Serbs four months to reach agreement on the province's future status -- but it would not automatically trigger a route to independence if talks fail, UN dip-lomats said on Tuesday.
The new text would address one of Russia's major objections to the current draft resolution before the UN Security Council, but it would almost certainly anger Kosovo's ethnic Albanians, who comprise 90 percent of the province's 2 million population and have been clamoring for independence.
The current text calls for four months of negotiations between the two sides with an automatic road to independence if there is no agreement, unless the Security Council decided otherwise.
Russia's UN Ambassador Vitaly Churkin called that draft "unacceptable" for a number of reasons including that with the carrot of independence dangling after four months, the Kosovo Albanians would not engage in serious negotiations.
With Russia refusing to even discuss the current text, and hinting strongly at a veto if it is put to a vote, the resolution's Western sponsors have been working on a new text that could win Security Council approval.
"We have to make every effort to get ... to an acceptable compromise solution," Italy's UN Ambassador Marcello Spatafora said.
He said the sponsors of the resolution -- the council's EU members including Italy and the US -- want serious negotiations between Kosovo's majority ethnic Albanians and minority Serbs with "no pre-set result."
While Kosovo remains a province of Serbia, it has been under UN and NATO administration since a 78-day NATO-led air war that halted a Serb crackdown on ethnic Albanian separatists in 1999.
In April, UN envoy Martti Ahtisaari recommended that Kosovo be granted internationally supervised independence -- a proposal strongly supported by its ethnic Albanians but vehemently rejected by its Serb minority, Serbia, and Russia, which has close cultural and religious ties to the Serbs.
Speaking in Kyrgyzstan, on Monday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said, "Any solution is possible on the basis of agreement by both sides involved. Any other decision cannot make it through the Security Council."
A revised Kosovo resolution is expected to be circulated later this week.
US Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad told reporters Monday that "the next week, 10 days, is a decisive period with regard to the Security Council's role in making a decision on this issue."
But Khalilzad warned Monday that "not dealing with this issue can worsen the situation -- and a problem of Kosovo, if unattended, is a potential threat to peace and security of Europe."
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who supports the Ahtisaari plan, warned Tuesday in Brussels that further delays in resolving Kosovo's future could lead to violence in the Serbian province and elsewhere in the region. He appealed to the parties not to "take any unilateral moves."
There is widespread concern in the Security Council and the region that the province's ethnic Albanian leaders could declare independence unilaterally if the council does not approve a path to independence.
Russia and China are also concerned that having the Security Council grant independence to a province of a sovereign country would set a dangerous precedent. The Americans and Europeans insist Kosovo is "a special case" because of Yugoslavia's violent breakup.
When Spatafora was asked how the positions of Kosovo's Serbs and Albanians can ever be reconciled since the constitution of Serbia prevents giving up any territory, the Italian ambassador stressed that "the wider picture for everybody in the area is the European anchorage and European perspective."
ANGER: A video shared online showed residents in a neighborhood confronting the national security minister, attempting to drag her toward floodwaters Argentina’s port city of Bahia Blanca has been “destroyed” after being pummeled by a year’s worth of rain in a matter of hours, killing 13 and driving hundreds from their homes, authorities said on Saturday. Two young girls — reportedly aged four and one — were missing after possibly being swept away by floodwaters in the wake of Friday’s storm. The deluge left hospital rooms underwater, turned neighborhoods into islands and cut electricity to swaths of the city. Argentine Minister of National Security Patricia Bullrich said Bahia Blanca was “destroyed.” The death toll rose to 13 on Saturday, up from 10 on Friday, authorities
RARE EVENT: While some cultures have a negative view of eclipses, others see them as a chance to show how people can work together, a scientist said Stargazers across a swathe of the world marveled at a dramatic red “Blood Moon” during a rare total lunar eclipse in the early hours of yesterday morning. The celestial spectacle was visible in the Americas and Pacific and Atlantic oceans, as well as in the westernmost parts of Europe and Africa. The phenomenon happens when the sun, Earth and moon line up, causing our planet to cast a giant shadow across its satellite. But as the Earth’s shadow crept across the moon, it did not entirely blot out its white glow — instead the moon glowed a reddish color. This is because the
DEBT BREAK: Friedrich Merz has vowed to do ‘whatever it takes’ to free up more money for defense and infrastructure at a time of growing geopolitical uncertainty Germany’s likely next leader Friedrich Merz was set yesterday to defend his unprecedented plans to massively ramp up defense and infrastructure spending in the Bundestag as lawmakers begin debating the proposals. Merz unveiled the plans last week, vowing his center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU)/Christian Social Union (CSU) bloc and the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) — in talks to form a coalition after last month’s elections — would quickly push them through before the end of the current legislature. Fraying Europe-US ties under US President Donald Trump have fueled calls for Germany, long dependent on the US security umbrella, to quickly
Local officials from Russia’s ruling party have caused controversy by presenting mothers of soldiers killed in Ukraine with gifts of meat grinders, an appliance widely used to describe Russia’s brutal tactics on the front line. The United Russia party in the northern Murmansk region posted photographs on social media showing officials smiling as they visited bereaved mothers with gifts of flowers and boxed meat grinders for International Women’s Day on Saturday, which is widely celebrated in Russia. The post included a message thanking the “dear moms” for their “strength of spirit and the love you put into bringing up your sons.” It
RSS